Former residents of Schubart Park emerged victorious in the Pretoria High Court on Tuesday as the seemingly battle-fatigued City of Tshwane (CoT) Municipality lawyers succumbed to their demands ahead of the scheduled arguments in court.
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Schubart Park residents marching to Tshwane House to demand what rightfully theirs photo by Dimakatso Modipa
In November the selfsame high court had recommended that the warring parties reach an out-of-court settlement as its (the court) ruling would have devastating consequences for the litigants who would end up losing the court case.
Ali Mashimbye Chairperson of Schubart Park Residents Committee
The bone of contention between the City of Tshwane Municipality and the former residents of Schubart Park is that the former residents want the CoT to continue paying rent for them at their places of abode after evacuating them from Schubart Park.
On the other hand the CoT holds that it has spent millions of rand paying rent for the said Schubart Park residents and that this has come to be regarded as wasteful and irregular expenditure by some political parties in the Municipality’s chambers and a decision had been taken to stop paying the said rent from January 2024.
On 3 December 2025 during a mediation process, the warring parties failed to reach consensus and both of them vowed to present their cases in court.
But just before the case could be heard, the City of Tshwane Municipality lawyers announced that their client would adhere to the demands of the Schubart Park residents and no longer wished to continue with the litigation process.
“We received a call from our lawyers informing us that the CoT has agreed to reach an agreement with us based on our own initial demands and proposals,” said jubilant Schubart Park Residents Committee chairperson Ali Mashimbye in an exclusive interview with Tshwane Talks.
Their demands are as follows:
1. Serviced stands and/or land.
2.RDP houses for those earning within the City’s free housing threshold.
3.Prioritisation of former Schubart Park residents when allocating accommodation to residents of Tshwane at Schubart Park when refurbishments have been completed there.
4. An end to the intended eviction of former residents of Schubart Park from the alternative places of abode wherein they had originally been placed by the CoT itself since 2011.
5. CoT to continue paying rent to the landlords where the former Schubart Park residents are staying at the moment.
At the time of publishing this story the CoT had not submitted its response to these new developments.
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